Reading:Cranberry Jam
First posted at Good.is, the Good Magazine website:
The history of Thanksgiving is much deeper than you think. Plus, a Thanksgiving jam recipe.
Thanksgiving is a myth, or at least it is as taught to school children. I don’t mean to be a spoil-sport. Thanksgiving is still my favorite holiday, in part because it sanctifies gluttony. More meaningfully, it also is the rare holiday that is framed by beliefs I hold dear: about nature’s abundance, the vitality of kinship across the generations, and the universal brotherhood of the table.
But the fond story about Pilgrims in brass-buckle shoes being saved from starvation in 1621 by kindly buckskin-clad Indians bearing gifts of wild game and corn is a legend, according to a fascinating article by food historian Andrew F. Smith that appeared in the fall, 2003, issue of the academic journal Gastronomica. The Thanksgiving meal is as laden with symbolism as sustenance; it’s just that the true meaning isn’t exactly what we learned in grade school.
After the grave Puritans arrived on the Mayflower and established Plimoth Plantation in 1620, they promptly began to issue all sorts of thanksgiving proclamations. These “celebrations” might be declared in observance of “a military victory, a good harvest, or a providential rainfall,” says Smith, but they were solemn days of prayer, not sumptuous meals shared with their First Nation brothers.
It’s true that there does exist a letter dated December, 1621, that mentions a big feast of wild fowl eaten with Native American king Massasoit and his men, and the missive has since been enshrined as evidence of the original thanksgiving feast. But the purpose of this letter makes it suspect: It was sent to England to attract more settlers to Plimoth Plantation. Rather than the founding document of America’s a multicultural past, it’s more of a hyped-up real-estate advertisement.
The idea of a national day of feasting, family, and reflection belonged to the 19th century and was promulgated by an energetic writer named Sarah Josepha Hale. Best remembered by history for having penned the verses for “Mary Had a Little Lamb,” Hale also wrote the 1827 novel Northwood; a Tale of New England, which included an entire chapter on thanksgiving. She laid out quite a spread: a roast turkey with stuffing, pumpkin pie, and “plates of pickles, preserves … and all the necessaries for increasing the seasoning of the viands to the demand of each palate.” This florid passage established the template for the traditional turkey dinner, the same menu sentimentalized in Norman Rockwell’s 1943 painting Freedom from Want.
We still eat turkey with all the trimmings today largely thanks to Hale’s political acumen. She worked her connections all the way up to President Lincoln, to whom she wrote a personal letter persuading him to make thanksgiving a national holiday. In 1863, a few months after the battle of Gettysburg, Lincoln did just that, declaring the last Thursday in November as Thanksgiving Day. (But why so late in the season—long after the the harvest season has succumbed to barren frost in many parts of the country?)
The idea of a thanksgiving feast, however, is older than Lincoln, Hale, or the Pilgrims. Indeed, buried beneath Rockwell’s layers of sentiment and piety are the dim outlines of pagan customs of autumnal gorging. The Celts, the Germanic tribes and the Greeks all had their own version of the harvest festival, and likely the idea of feasting to celebrate the end of communal work is as old as organized agriculture itself. (Before lasagna came to The Olive Garden, it was first a traditional hay-harvest dish in the French Alps, where after a good day’s work you were said to have “earned your lasagna.”) In other words, I love Thanksgiving because it’s older than America—even older perhaps than the Christian faith which moves many to say Grace before the meal.
What Thanksgiving does have to say about America’s past that is both true and worth remembering is that from the earliest Pilgrim days, the American diet has been cosmopolitan, dependent from its start on edible species from two hemispheres. The late, great Guy Davenport observes in his essay about painter Charles Burchfield:
“The honey bee came over with the settlers of New England, along with the apple tree and the pear. Two enormous ecologies blended in the New World, where pumpkin, maize, persimmon, melon, and other native vegetables changed the European palate.”
The Thanksgiving meal heaps the bounty of these “two enormous ecologies” onto one groaning board: pumpkin pie (America) and Brussel spouts (Europe). Just as vividly, it acknowledges the bounty of the New World’s aboriginal forests: the wild turkey, Meleagris gallopavo, is a native game bird that was important to the Pilgrims’ survival and can still he hunted in many parts of the country today.
In this sense, Thanksgiving is a testament to the culinary opportunism of trans-Atlantic immigrants who cooked everything they could find to nourish their bodies—and for that matter, their souls. That’s a Thanksgiving tradition worth celebrating.
As a jam-maker, I’m pleased that Hale’s ur-Thanksgiving extravaganza included “preserves … for increasing the seasoning of the viands.” Today’s Thanksgiving is probably the single meal in our entire food calendar when almost everyone adds a bit of little sweet preserves—cranberry jelly—to their savory plate. It’s an old-fashioned thing to do, but one that is suddenly trendy again thanks to the ongoing renaissance of home-made and artisanal jams, jellies, and pickles. The Slow Food movement has helped spur interest in home canning, and Thanksgiving provides the perfect occasion for anyone who ever wanted to try his hands at making a little pot of jam.
Cranberry jam is perhaps the very easiest sweet preserve to make—it’s quick and virtually foolproof—and the results are vastly superior to the jello-stuff that glops out of a can.
This recipe, in the spirit of the Pilgrims—and our global age—pays tribute to multiple continents: the cranberry is a native North American species (order organic berries from Cranberry Hill), apples arrived to America via Europe, and oranges, ginger and cinnamon come from Asia. You can adjust the quantity of cranberries to suit what you have, just as long as you equally adjust the amount of sugar to maintain a 1:1 ratio of berries to fruit. (Note: a heaping cup of sugar equals one-half pound.)
CHUNKY CRANBERRY JAM
Ingredients:
1 pound cranberries
1 hard apple such as Arkansas Black or Granny Smith, peeled, cored and sliced into 1/2-inch chunks
1 cup water
2 cups sugar
1 tablespoon chopped fresh ginger or crystallized ginger
3 inch cinnamon stick
zest of 1 orange in finest possible threads
1 teaspoon vodka
1/4 cup chopped pecans
1: Rinse cranberries and put in a kettle with water, cubed apple, ginger, cinnamon stick, and orange zest. Bring to a boil and simmer for 5 minutes until berries pop.
2: Add sugar to the kettle and return to a gentle boil, stirring constantly. Once the sugar has fully dissolved, add vodka and nuts and cook for 2-3 minutes more until thickened, stirring carefully to prevent scorching.
3: Remove cinnamon stick and serve or refrigerate in a covered container for up to two weeks. If you want to can the jam: ladle hot jam into prepared 1/2 pint jars and seal. Process sealed jars in a boiling water bath for 10 minutes.
Banner art: Jean Leon Gerome Ferris, The First Thanksgiving, 1621 (1919)
Guest blogger Kevin West is West Coast editor of W Magazine and the proprietor of the canning website Saving the Season. He’ll give a free demonstration of how to make cranberry jam and persimmon butter at Surfas in Los Angeles on Saturday, Nov. 7, at 11:00 a.m.
UPDATE
My college classmate Max Edelson emailed me an insightful comment on the above post:
"Sidney Mintz comments on the modern loss of the savory-sweet combination in his great book, Sweetness and Power. He also argues that traditional foods are frequently archives of past food practices, as with wedding cakes preserving the early modern sugar sculptures of elite feasts. I also like James McWilliams's book, A Revolution in Eating, on early American food culture."
Reader Comments (4)
New Recipe: 1 helium ballon, 1 wild turkey and a moron. this is another fantastic endeaver to achieve fame as a historical journalist. You must have a PHD (Piled Higher and Deeper )in historical events. I can't want for your historical view of Christmas.
Hi James -- thanks for your comment -- please let me know about factual errors and i'll of course correct them with due credit -- the principal source for much of the historical material in this post was, as cited, an article from food historian and general editor of *The Oxford Companion to American Food and Drink* Andrew F. Smith. The article, "The First Thanksgiving," ran in the Fall 2003 issue of *Gastronomica.* Another useful reference, although it is pretty heavily slanted towards European and especially French food history, is Maguelonne Toussaint-Samat's *History of Food* -- and then the good ole *Oxford Companion to Food* was also, as ever, a reliable stand-by. In a less academic vein, Jeffrey Steingarten wrote engagingly about the history of the turkey in *The Man Who Ate Everything.* I'm a food blogger and not a professional historian, so i'd certainly welcome any references that would inform the post. finally - i'm heartened that you find the blog "fantastic" but alas i'm convinced that blogging about home canning is a very slow path to fame -- but i'll take some hope from your encouragements -- best regards, kevin west
Kevin,
I atttended the Surfas demo where you demonstrated this recipe, and I really enjoyed it. You have a great knack for teaching in a clear and entertaining manner. I have three questions as I attempt this recipe. First, I plan to use 4oz jelly jars instead of 1/2 pint jars...would the ten minute processing time in the boiler still hold for the smaller jar size or would it be less? Second, what is the appropriate headspace for that size jar? Third, can the jam be processed after having been refrigerated for several days, or must it be processed immediately? Thanking you in advance!
- Francis
Hi Francis -- thank you for your nice comment and your excellent questions. If using 4 oz jars -- which i use a lot because they make great gifts -- you can leave just 1/4" head space, but then use the same processing time as for 1/2 pints. It's ok in principal to refrigerate your jam before processing, but here's the problem: before canning the jam and processing the jars, you have to reheat the refrigerated jam to a boil so that it's hot when you ladle it into the jars. if you do this, take great care not to scorch the jam as you reheat it. be sure to add a little water and keep a very low flame on the burner. it's probably better to find a time when you can do the whole recipe, start to finish, at one go. good luck! all the best, kevin